There are several strands to Sputnik's work including:

- producing new Russian plays in the UK

- programming and organising the Russian Theatre Festival in London

- developing Russian playwriting through commissions and exchanges

- outreach work bringing drama to disadvantaged young people

- cultural events with Russian literature and music

Sputnik Theatre Company Limited is a not-for-profit company No. 6873417.

Why Russia?

Russia has a history of theatrical innovation. Russian playwrights have played a significant role in shaping modern European theatre.

Contemporary playwriting in Russia has been going through an important and innovative period since 1991 with a prolific output by predominantly young dramatists. Young Russian playwrights are experimenting with subject and genre as well as responding to the ongoing political and social changes in their country.

A number of pioneering theatres and individuals are ensuring that new playwriting talents are being produced in cities across Russia. Sputnik is bringing these playwrights and their plays to British audiences.

Board of Directors

Noah Birksted-Breen
Artistic director of Sputnik Theatre Company, Noah won the ITV Theatre Directors' Award, working for a year and a half as resident director at Hampstead Theatre where he trained alongside directors including Rupert Goold, Polly Teale, Lucy Bailey and Anthony Clark. Time Out wrote in an annual round-up review of British Theatre: “Tip for the top: Noah Birksted-Breen, director and translator of Sputnik Theatre”. Noah speaks fluent Russian: he did a Modern Languages degree at Oxford University, including one year studying at the St. Petersburg State University, and he completed an MA in Playwriting at Central School of Speech and Drama.

Sue Dunderdale
Sue runs the Directing Course and the MA in Text and Performance at Rada. She is also a freelance theatre and film director and a writer, known mainly for her work with new writing. Her last production was WUTHERING HEIGHTS at York Theatre Royal where she has also directed the premier of MRS. PAT by Pam Gems. She has written and directed three short films, LAST LAUGH, ANGEL by Chloe Moss and MINE. She has also directed numerous dramas for television. She is about to direct EXPOSED by Judy Upton, a short film, for Screen South.

Colin Magee
Colin is currently General Counsel and Company Secretary at VTB Capital plc (previously the Moscow Narodny Bank Ltd). Prior to that, he worked for Clifford Chance as Solicitor in the Real Estate Finance Department. Colin completed his MA in Jurisprudence at Oxford University and received his MSc in Finance and Financial Law with distinction from the University of London.

Simon Stokes
Simon is the Artistic Director at the Theatre Royal Plymouth. He was Artistic Director at the Bush Theatre from the mid 1970's to the late 1980's. Thereafter, alongside a freelance career, he was Artistic Associate and Director of Development for the Turnstyle Group in London's West End. A new play specialist, he developed and directed many of our now established playwrights, along with a generation of now leading actors. He trained at the Bristol Old Vic Theatre School and has directed in Germany, Switzerland, Israel and the USA, as well as the UK. His most highly profiled work has included the West End successes When I Was a Girl I Used to Scream and Shout by Sharman Macdonald (with Julie Walters, Geraldine James and Dawn French) at the Whitehall Theatre and A Slip of the Tongue by Dusty Hughes (with John Malkovich and Ingeborga Dapkunaite) at the Shaftesbury Theatre. In Plymouth he has directed Moonshine by Snoo Wilson, Through A Cloud by Jack Shepherd, two plays by Doug Lucie - The Green Man and Presence - and Lucinda Coxon's Nostalgia.

Artistic Advisers

Birgit Beumers
Birgit is Reader in Russian at the University of Bristol. She completed her D.Phil at St Antony's College, Oxford and specialises in contemporary Russian culture, especially cinema and theatre. Her publications include Burnt by the Sun (2000), Nikita Mikhalkov: Between Nostalgia and Nationalism (2005), PopCulture: Russia! (2005), History of Russian Cinema (2009) and, as editor, Russia on Reels: The Russian Idea in Post-Soviet Cinema (1999) and 24 Frames: Russia and the Soviet Union (2007). With Mark Lipovetsky she has co-authored a book on New Russian Drama (forthcoming with Intellect). She is editor of the online journal KinoKultura and of the journal Studies in Russian and Soviet Cinema. She is currently working on Russian animation.

John Freedman
John is a writer and translator based in Moscow. He has been the theatre critic of The Moscow Times since 1992, and has written or edited nine books on Russian theatre. His translations have been produced in the United States, Australia and Canada.

Elena Koval'skaya
Elena graduated from the Russian Academy of Theatre Arts (GITIS) with a specialisation in theatre studies. She now teaches the history of European theatre at GITIS. For the last ten years, she has been a theatre reviewer for the newspaper “Afisha”. She is an adviser to the Golden Mask Festival, three times programming the Golden Mask's “Russian Case”. Elena is also the artistic director of the Lyubimovka festival for young playwrights in Moscow.